Reflective Collective

What happens when eight talented women — all of whom are involved in creative communities across Franklin, Hampshire, and Hampden counties — meet to make poetry and art together? In the case of Exploded View, they create multimedia exhibits and spoken-word performances unlike anything else in the Valley.

Exploded View was conceived by Candace Curran, who showed up at Samantha Wood’s studio one day last spring hauling a stack of old auto repair guides with exploded diagrams of engines. “I’ve fallen in love with parts manuals,” she said. “What do you think of this?” She proceeded to describe her idea for a dynamic group display of work produced by local writers and artists. Samantha Wood, a writer, artist and editor, was then creating “The  Uncertainty Cube,” an installation for Eggtooth Productions and the Full Disclosure Festival in Greenfield this past June. She liked Curran’s idea. They put out the word, and they were soon joined by Lea Banks, Trish Crapo, Edite Cunha, Ixchelailee (Diana Pedrosa; not pictured), Elizabeth MacDuffie, and Nina Rossi. Since then, the members have been developing an artistic view of parts relative to a whole — of how breaking something apart can explain a way of seeing the relationships between parts, whole or broken. Their emerging brand of dynamic physical art shows — like the one this weekend in downtown Greenfield — includes sculpture, installation, textile arts, film, collage, music, digital works, and live performance, all of which touches on love, violence, loss, hopelessness, place, the power of finding voice, and the power of collaboration itself. 

Exploded View: Sunday at 4 p.m. $10 suggested donation. Pushkin Gallery, 4 Federal St., Greenfield. (978) 413-1611, candycurran@gmail.com.

— Hunter Styles,  hstyles@valleyadvocate.com